


Beneath Snow-Covered Branches

by lady__sansa_stark



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Bit of fluff and creep and good winter fun lol, Christmas fic, F/M, More like winter fic tho
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-25
Updated: 2016-12-25
Packaged: 2018-09-11 21:37:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9033095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lady__sansa_stark/pseuds/lady__sansa_stark
Summary: Petyr spies Sansa in the snow-covered godswood of the Eyrie, and asks for his daughter to help warm him up from the cold.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [VonPikafwance](https://archiveofourown.org/users/VonPikafwance/gifts).



> Requested by pikafwance on tumblr. The prompt was: Mistletoe.
> 
> [Here’s a short wintery fic. Enjoy!]

            The godswood of the Eyrie was sparse, hardly a wood in any sense of the name. The collection of statues far outnumbered the collection of trees, although green existed during spring and summer in the form of low shrubs and hedges. Of the trees that did survive in the rocky soil were thin and fragile, unsure how exactly they hadn’t withered into nothingness yet. The same could be said for the little lord Robert, as well.

            Now, with autumn falling away into winter, the godswood was nothing but a canvas of pale branches and white frost. The sunlight bouncing off the Eyrie’s white stone cast unusual shadows and colors upon the snow.

            Perhaps the most unusual of colors was a dark chestnut, free of littering snow.

            _Not quite as beautiful a color as red_.

            But no matter how often Petyr’s eyes fell on the boundless curls of brown ahead of him, or on the flash of skin at a wrist when she trailed fingers along the thin trees, Petyr could not ignore the blasted cold. The trees were sparse, yes, but the ice that found its way beneath his furs or into his lungs was not.

            And yet, Sansa hadn’t needed to weigh herself down in countless furs, like Petyr was. She appeared so casual, so at home, walking through the snow and grazing gloved fingers across branches and bushes covered in snow. She was calm, Petyr could tell. Sansa was forgetting: her aunt’s death, her lies, her position in the world as a bastard. Her _father_ , especially, who stood at the edge of the wood spying on her.

            Stark blood ran deep in her veins. And now with dyed hair, she was Stark inside and out.

            Except she wasn’t. Not now. With false hair and false name, Sansa was anything but a highborn lady of the North. Sansa was nothing to nearly everyone. A friend of sorts to some, a replacement mother for wailing Robert.

            Oh, but she was definitely _something_ to Petyr, who could not keep his eyes from her as she wended her way through the godswood.

            Sansa had lied for him. Had lied straight into the faces of all the lords and ladies of the Vale. Petyr had seen the underlying hesitation in her hands and face. There was a string of sorts, tying them intractably together, from the moment the first lie fell from those pretty pink lips.

            But now, with a week between today and then, and the Eyrie silent again, Petyr could see and feel that string. He crept his fingers along its length, pulling and pulling to find its source. And as he went, the string a seemingly endless thing, he knew it had always been there. Coiled in his chest, in the cavity where his heart had once been – when Petyr had still believed in stories and songs. Not for a long, long time had he allowed such trivial things to snake its way and ruin him. Never again.

            Still, the string stretched between him and Sansa.

            Perhaps it grew on the night of his horrid wedding to Lysa at the Fingers. Or the night he whisked Sansa away from the untimely death of Joffrey. Or after the Battle of Blackwater, when he offered to take the girl from Cersei’s hands shortly after earning Harrenhal. Or earlier, at the tourney, when Petyr had to double-take that it was not in fact Catelyn sitting in the stands.

            On and on Petyr pulled at the thread. No matter how long he kept at it, he couldn’t seem to find the start.

            But the end was there – before him, sitting on the edge of a long-dead stump at the edge of a copse of dying trees covered in snow. She was staring up into the spindly arms of branches.

            Petyr gave up on the string for now. He would not keep pulling and pulling, for fear of setting the thread too taut and snapping.

            He approached, his footsteps crunching in the dirty snow. His breath left a trail of white puffs as he went – the cold hurt his lungs.

            “My sweet Alayne,” Petyr said, stopping several feet behind his daughter. Despite their false pretense, he couldn’t help but feel the twinge of something at the idea that she was his daughter – and not something else. “You’ve been out here for a while, I imagine. Aren’t you cold?”

            “I’m quite alright.” Sansa slowly brought her gaze down from the overhanging branches onto him. There wasn’t alarm in her eyes. She had known he was spying on her. Just recently, or for the full half hour Petyr had been standing at the godswood’s edge?

            He took a step closer, gazing out at the sad excuse of the godswood. His hands dug as far into his furs as possible, and still they felt like they were about to freeze solid.

            “You must be used to the cold, sweetling. I can’t imagine living in these conditions year round.” Sansa didn’t reply, only continued to stare.

            A thought crossed his mind then. Petyr had to tug down on the wayward smirk that was threatening his lips up. He pulled his hands out, flexing his fingers at the biting cold. “Alayne, my dear daughter. Could you be so kind to help warm your poor father’s fingers? It feels as though they are about to freeze numb.”

            There – that got a rise out of the girl. Sansa’s brows rose at the audacity of her _father_ to ask such a thing. A thing, both of them were sure, that a daughter didn’t do for her father. Perhaps the other way around, maybe. And if Sansa had ever asked for Petyr to _warm her up_ , he would be only too happy to oblige.

            Sansa stood after a few moments, reaching for Petyr’s fingers with her own that were gloved in fur-trimmed mittens. She sandwiched both of his hands between hers, running her hands from his wrists down to the tips of his fingers, and back. Slow, repetitive strokes along his hands, the wool of her mittens scratching at his skin.

            The action itself, if anything, was a noble effort on Sansa’s part – her hands were smaller than his, unable to truly combat the chill. Petyr thought his fingers were _colder_ now from the motions. But Petyr knew that other parts of him _did_ become considerably warmer.

            Petyr couldn’t stop the smirk that did tug at his lips, now. At the _implication_ of her motions. At how her hands might feel should they move, up and down and painfully – but deliciously – slowly, upon something else. And perhaps Sansa, beneath the feigned innocence and wide eyes, knew of the implications, too.

            Still, he couldn’t help himself when Petyr added in a hushed voice: “It would feel better were you to use your mouth, too, sweetling.”

            Her hands froze. And Petyr knew, that somewhere between here and King’s Landing, Sansa’s own innocence had begun to crumble away. What he would do to be the man to completely strip this beautiful girl of every last shred of innocence. Until there was nothing left of that naïve child with stories in her head. Until she was, without a doubt, _his_.

            But not today.

            Petyr was staring at Sansa’s face, at the adorable flurry of emotions warring in her eyes. He could tell she was debating whether to obey her loving _father_ , who of course knew what was best for his daughter (though couldn’t deny the few selfish whims that broke through). Petyr waited. Whether Sansa agreed or flat-out refused, Petyr would relent to her wishes. But he would provide her the choice: the will to give in or not.

            She licked her lips, still debating. The seconds passed by in a cold silence. Somehow, he thought he felt her heartbeat echo through the wool mittens and into his fingers, up along his arms, and resonate within his own chest.

            Finally, Sansa bent her head towards their clasped hands, releasing the smallest breath of air upon his skin. It was warm, hot. It tickled life back into his flesh, and sent another wave of warmth further down.

            But that was all. Sansa would relent to Petyr’s wishes, but on her own terms.

            He smiled at his daughter as she removed her hands from his. “Thank you, Alayne. Your father is much warmer now.”

            There was a pink flush to Sansa’s cheeks – from the cold, yes, as there certainly was to Petyr’s. But the pink ran redder, warmer. Petyr couldn’t help but wonder at the wicked sort of delight that his sweet daughter had taken in the innocuous act, too.

            “I’ll see you at supper, then.” He turned to leave when a hand tugged at his furs. Petyr glanced back at Sansa, who was staring up now into the weave of dead, snow-covered branches above. Petyr followed her gaze as he asked, “Is something the matter, Alayne?”

            She didn’t look back at him. “Do you know what that plant is up there, father?”

            Petyr saw it, then. A ratty tangle of green and specks of white, covered in snow and shadows. Small, almost unseen. But now that he spied it, Petyr couldn’t stop staring at the green that thrived amongst the dying trees. No, not amongst the trees. _Because_ of the trees. Living off of another. He was sure he’d seen them, this plant, but hadn’t bothered to pay it much attention. “It’s a sort of weedy parasite, is it not?”

            Sansa said, “Yes, it is. It thrives off of another. It’s called a mistletoe, though the people of the North call it by a different name.”

            When she hadn’t continued, Petyr prompted, “And that is?”

            “Well, the little white berries, if eaten, can kill people. Not animals, just people.” Petyr was staring at her now, their eyes not leaving one another’s. The flush was still there, redder now. “So, there’s a tradition, that two people can fight the killing power of the mistletoe, removing one berry at a time.”

            Petyr let out a small chuckle. “Why don’t you just remove the entire plant and be done with it?”

            Sansa looked offended. “Because only the berries are poisonous, not the leaves. And the leaves are growing, thriving in the harsh winter.”

            “And what do two people have to do to remove the berries, one at a time.” He looked at the brush of mistletoe – there had to be at least a dozen berries clustered there.

            He felt Sansa’s hands threading through the endless furs at his chest. When Petyr looked back down, he hadn’t expected to see Sansa’s face inches him.

            Or feel the soft, warm press of her lips against his. It was a gentle thing, like the sorts of kisses he asked of her as his daughter.

            But it also wasn’t gentle – it wasn’t the stiff press that she was oft tempted to give him, or the various other quick pecks. There was something _more_ to it, something Petyr wasn’t quite sure had a name. He could feel the ache deep within him echo in the tight hold of her fingers on his furs. Could feel her heat radiate off of her from how close they were pressed.

            And then it was gone.

            “They’re called kiss stealers,” Sansa said, her lips and fingers and body removed from his. She lifted a hand to carefully pluck one of the white berries, standing on tip-toes to reach the greenish tangle. Sansa rolled it in the palm of her mitten before tossing it into the snow. She looked up at him, a shadow of a smile on her mouth. “I’ll see you tonight at supper, father.”

            Petyr watched her leave, walking between the trees and back inside the warm walls of the Eyrie. He could still feel the tingle of Sansa’s lips on his. He could still feel how her fingers had not just held onto his furs for support, but had been _digging_ in.

            The fact that Sansa might have been enjoying his own selfish wishes as much as he had sent a thrill of excitement and desire through him.

            There was that pull again at the string between them. Urging him to go and follow.

            Not now, he reasoned. Perhaps in a month, a year. Petyr would allow her to slowly open up, to slowly warm to the thought of him as _Petyr_ , and not as the Lord Protector or Littlefinger or any other shadow of a man she might she him as.

            He stared at the stump where Sansa had been sitting. Had been waiting. Allowing him to spy on her. Knowing full well of the devious plant that sat just above her.

            He smiled. Perhaps Sansa would warm to Petyr much sooner than he hoped.

**Author's Note:**

> [It uh…got a bit suggestive there, lol. I hope you liked it though!  
> Tbh I’m definitely more a Petyr than a Sansa – I’m such a wuss when it comes to the cold lol]


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